Monday, October 29, 2012

Tutorial #2

I’ve finished to rough draft of tutorial #2.This tutorial basically teaches the player
how to land a fighter on a stationary battlestar.The player starts in optimal position to land
the fighter, and the instructor instructs the player each step necessary to
land the fighter.Key concepts for this
tutorial is the ability to roll the fighter using the A and D keys to align the
fighter with the battlestar.

This tutorial is short, possibly too short.The next tutorial in this series will put
both tutorial #1 and #2 together.I
envision it being the player’s first solo flight.The player launches from the battlestar,
flies to each preprogrammed waypoint (three total) and lands the fighter on the
battlestar.The fourth tutorial will
serve as a pre-test for the final tutorial.Basically tutorial #4 would involve launching from the battlestar,
travelling to each waypoint, performing a task (like rolling the fighter,
gliding the fighter and so on) and landing the fighter onboard the
battlestar.The final tutorial would be
a “final exam” for basic flight school.

Back to tutorial #2, here’s the link to the build.rar that has the
program files:

It utilizes the same map as tutorial #1.It just didn’t make sense to create a brand
new map for the tutorial.It uses the
same basic framework of the previous tutorial programs.The only major difference is the inclusion of
some extra trigger generators attached to the gravity control scripts for the
landing bays.I guess I should have
upped the prototype number to 258 versus using 257.That’s my mistake.

Now that I have two distinctive missions in the database, I need to
create a system to load each mission using a single program.The current setup requires the user to launch
the two tutorials as separate programs.To
make this happen, the program will need to perform some basic operations.First, it has to track the progression of
missions.Once tutorial #1 is completed,
the name “Tutorial #1” needs to be replaced by “Tutorial #2” in the resource
manager.Second, it needs, well I really
want this, to track the player’s files.Each individual player will have a unique database record.This will facilitate tracking the player’s
career and progression in the game.While prototype two will not have a character creation process, it needs
to support the concept.This will make
transitioning to prototype #3 an easier process.

These two factors should be incorporated as a table in the
database.Each player, with the proper
player ID code, should track which mission is next.It should also track things like prestige,
number of kills and other things; however, I haven’t gotten that far into the
process just yet.This table will be
used as a tracker between scenes.

As an example, the first “real” screen will be a mission briefing
screen.In this screen, the player
receives a briefing for that mission.I
plan on making this an animated and interactive scene.At the end (or during depending on
perspective) of the scene, the player’s mission data is saved to the
table.When the actual mission scene is
loaded, that scene loads the mission data from the previously saved
record.Once the mission concluded, key
data is saved to the database, like the debriefing screen (if applicable).The next screen loads this data from the database,
and so on and so on…